Techmeme
April 29, 2021, 11:25 AM

Top News

Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft says it will reduce its cut for PC games in Windows store from 30% to 12% from August 1, in a bid to compete with Steam  —  Microsoft puts the pressure on Valve's Steam store  —  Microsoft is shaking up the world of PC gaming today with a big cut to the amount of revenue it takes from games on Windows.
Apple:
Apple reports record Q2 revenue of $89.6B, up 54% YoY, net income of $23.6B, up from $11.2B YoY, iPhone sales of $47.9B, up from $29B YoY  —  Revenue up 54 percent to new March quarter record  —  Services and Mac revenue reach new all-time high  —  Apple today announced financial results …
Chance Miller / 9to5Mac:
Tim Cook says supply shortages will likely impact the Mac and iPad lineups in Q3 due to “legacy node” chip production that uses older manufacturing methods  —  Apple just reported record earnings for Q2 2021, but the company is also warning of supply shortages affecting the Mac and iPad lineups.
Malcolm Owen / AppleInsider:
Alex Weprin / Hollywood Reporter:
Stephanie Condon / ZDNet:
Facebook says Q1 ad revenue was $25.4B, up 46% YoY, expects continued growth in Q2, with headwinds in H2 due to regulatory changes and Apple's iOS 14.5 update  —  The average price per ad in Q1 increased by 30 percent year-over-year, driving up Facebook ad revenue growth.
Investor Relations:
Reuters:
Gilad Edelman / Wired:
Q&A: Evelyn Douek, a lecturer and Ph.D. student at Harvard studying online speech regulation, on why a “proportional” approach to online speech is a good thing  —  Major platforms' policies aren't actually inspired by the First Amendment.  This legal scholar says that's a good thing.
Canalys.com:
Canalys: Q1 global smartphone shipments reach 347M, up 27% YoY; Samsung took first place shipping 76.5M for a 22% share, Apple shipping 52.4M for a 15% share  —  Shanghai (China), Bengaluru (India), Singapore, Reading (UK) and Portland (US) - Thursday, 29 April 2021
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Google finally gives users a way to search through Stadia's 172 games, 526 days after the service's launch  —  If only Google knew anyone with experience building search engines  —  Stadia is an online game streaming service from Google, a company that is practically synonymous with search engines …
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Facebook says it blocked all posts with “#ResignModi” in India due to a mistake and not due to a government order, and the posts have now been restored  —  Updated at 1.17am IST, Thursday: Facebook comms Andy Stone said the company has restored the posts and is “looking into what happened.”
James Vincent / The Verge:
Researchers demonstrate how AI software based on generative adversarial networks can be used to create deepfake satellite images  —  Geographic deepfakes could be used for misinformation and much more  —  When we think of deepfakes, we tend to imagine AI-generated people.
Kurt Schlosser / GeekWire:
Amazon will invest $1B+ to increase wages for more than 500K of its warehouse workers by $.50 to $3 an hour, rolling out from mid-May to early June  —  Amazon announced Wednesday that it plans to invest more than $1 billion in wage increases for its operations workers, promising raises …
Sheila Dang / Reuters:
Facebook says it is giving $5M to support local journalists using its new newsletter service; candidates covering communities of color will be given priority  —  Facebook Inc said Thursday it will give $5 million to pay local journalists in multi-year deals as part of its new publishing platform …

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More News

Natalia Drozdiak / Bloomberg:

Earlier Picks

Ben Lovejoy / 9to5Mac:
Josef Adalian / Vulture: